Astronomer dr. Steven M. Beard work for the Royal Observatory Edinburgh, is married to fantasy author Elizabeth kerner, and a friend of Anne McCaffrey. He assisted Anne when she was writing on The Skies of Pern and a volume in the Pegasus series. He usually downplays his role in delivering data for The Skies of Pern butnevertheless the book is dedicated to him. Steven made Anne some star maps of how the skies look as seen from Pern and also fabricated a globe of Pern which he gifted to her.

A front view of the Pern globe that Steven M. Beard made for Anne McCaffrey. The globe was made from a plastic plumber's ball-cock (i.e. a float). Steven sanded down the edges to make it spherical and painted the surface using household emulsion paint mixed with some luminous paint to make the seas glow a little in the dark. All the Holds and Weyrs are marked with small blobs of luminous paint so they stand out in the dark.

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